2. Average letting agent fee calculator

Wherever your property is in the country, the below calculator will give you an idea of the average letting agent fees in your city. Simply enter the city your property has and the number of rooms.

The calculator will work out the expected rent you should expect based on national averages. You’re also able to see an estimation of your take home profit after letting agent fees, tax & bills.

3. Types of Letting Agent Fees

There are many types of fees rental agents charge landlords. This will be dictated by the services the landlord is looking for. The fees are generally broken down into the following groups

Letting agent tenant find fees

This fee is for the cost of advertising your property, answering tenant queries, conducting property viewings and creating the tenancy agreement. Depending on the agents terms and your agreement with them, this service can also include the ongoing rent collection for that tenant.

Letting agent fully management fees

This services goes over an above finding the tenant and is usually taken up by landlords looking for a hands off approach. The letting agent will in addition manage the property inspections, documentation, maintenance and for sure the ongoing rent collection.

Letting agent add on fees

There are a host of other activities that the letting agent can charge additional fees for. These include, but are not restricted to:

• Premium advertising
• Guaranteed rent policies
• Bill payment processing
• Tenancy renewal fees

As a landlord, you should always read the small print and understand what services are included and what you may be charged more for.

Guaranteed rent fees

This type of service is for landlords looking for a risk averse approach, by securing their rental income against a policy.  In the event that a tenant cannot (or won’t) pay their rent, the policy undertaken secures the income.  After a certain amount of time of unpaid rent, the policy will kick in and a landlord gets their payment.

Every policy differs. Some require a landlord to wait a few weeks or even months. On the other hand some policies pay out as soon as a payment is missed. Landlords using this service can get a peace of mind knowing any mortgage payments or bills aren’t at risk of a tenant not paying their rent.

There is a higher cost of this service, which means a landlord’s monthly income will take a hit. During the Covid-19 pandemic, landlord searches for guaranteed rent increased by 25%. In the midst of tenant arrears & eviction bans, it’s clear landlords were keen to get coverage from themselves. However many agents pulled back their offering of guaranteed rent.

Many agents couldn’t find a provider to underwrite this type of services as arrears across the country increased.

4. Letting agent fees in London

Finding a tenant, essentially involves posting a property on one of the leading portal sites. From there, tenant leads are generated as interest in the property is created.

Depending on the agent, a tenant find fee includes answering inquiries and conducting viewings. Following which, again depending on the agent, the service will include the drawing up of tenancy agreements, collecting the first rent & handover the keys to the property.

However online rental agents usually differ to the above offering. With an online rental agent, landlords can expect lower fees. With the lower fees landlords are expected to do more work, the most time intensive of which is conducting viewing themselves.

Letting agent fees for finding a tenant in London

The below table shows how much a letting agent in London will charge for finding a tenant. The structure of how an agent will charge a landlord differs.

Some prefer an ongoing monthly fixed fee or % of the rental income. While other charge a flat one off fee at the beginning of the tenancy.

Based on the data, there are huge variances between what fees are charged. The cheapest agent to find a tenant is 99home. Whereas the most expensive, based on a monthly rental income of £1,000 is Marybow and Base property specialists. However it’s not always that simple.

Marybow & Base property services focus on a small region within London, whereas 99home is nationwide. As a result, these 2 agents are likely to have distinct, niche knowledge of their area – for some landlords this may result in a better service for their particular property. There are a number of agents charged a fixed one off fee for finding a tenant for a property in London. This may be an advantage for landlords with property with a large rental income. 

For properties generating a monthly income of £3,000+ per month in rent, forking out 10%, £300 a month in tenant find fees can be costly. A fixed fee in this example may be the best course of action to take.  

Letting agent fees for full property management in London

Full property management is often a service landlords with a lack of experience or wish for a hands off buy to let property income. The fees are higher than finding a tenant due to the additional activity involved that the agent has to undertake. 

As with fees for finding a tenant, letting agents will charge based on varying sets of fee structures.  

Home-Made really offer a competitive deal when it comes to full management fees in London, charging just 4% per calendar month.

On a rental income of £1,000, Home-Made would be charging £480 per year. As always there are a number of agents charging fixed fees for managing a property.

Venndor charge an attractive £799 as a one off payment for full management. This could be attractive to landlords looking for the lowest priced letting agent.  

Letting agent fees for guaranteed rent in London

At the turn of the year 2020, near enough every agent had a guaranteed rent package available for landlords. However due to the rental arrears and additional risk Covid-19 has caused, many agents have been forced to pull back this type of service. This leaves landlords worried about the security of their rental income exposed.

However there are a few letting agents still open to providing this service. 99home have a rent guarantee package available at £85 per calendar month. With the scarcity in the market, this is proving a highly sought service from the nationwide letting agent

So who is the best letting agent in London?

Picking the best letting agent isn’t always simple. The cheapest doesn’t mean the best and the agent that will do the most for your property may not be cost effective enough for your aims.

Looking at how quickly an agent lets out your property and what rent they achieve, can be another good indicator to look at when picking your letting agent.

Take a look below and see which agents get the most rent and their timeframes to get your property rented out. Remember this data always fluctuates.

For a more accurate view, run a letting agent comparison on our homepage.  At the current time of writing Markeves and Hunter Ashley are the quickest letting agents in London on Rentround at renting out a property, with an average of 2 weeks.

Markeves in this instance looks particularly favourable, as its 2nd in the rankings for achieving the highest amount of rent, it an average of £2,002 per calendar month. The top spot of achieving the highest rent goes to Cole Harding. Operating mostly in North London, the agent on average achieves a rental income of £2,119.

5. Letting agent fees outside of London

If you want to compare letting agents in your area, use our comparison tool to get an understanding of agent fees & performance near you. We’ve also included some further data below on letting agents covering Birmingham, Yorkshire, Manchester & Liverpool.

Fees for finding a tenant in Birmingham

Fees for finding a tenant in Manchester

Fees for finding a tenant in Leeds

Fees for finding a tenant in Liverpool

Full management fees in Birmingham

Full management fees in Manchester

Full management fees in Liverpool

Full management fees in Leeds

So who is the best letting agent across the big cities?

Being title ‘the best letting agent’ is very subjective. Some agents may call themselves the best letting agent based on being the biggest.

Others may point to their ‘impartial’ awards they’d received over the years. While it’s for every landlord to decide who is the best letting agent for themselves, below is some performance data to help that decision. Remember if you’re looking for a letting agent when renting out your property, run a search using our agent comparison tool.  

6. Average Online letting agent fees

To get a fair view in this modern day, you need to consider online letting agents when trying to get a sense of what an agent may charge you.

Online letting agents aren’t for everyone, the expectation is the landlord would need to do more work than they would need to do under a ‘normal’ agent.

However no doubt, there are big savings landlords can make when getting an online agent to rent out their property. Some agents charge just double figure to find a tenant – a big difference to being charged an entire months rent to find a tenant, which some traditional agents charge.

The below table outlines how much online letting agents charge.

6. Average rental yields in the UK

As we’re a helpful bunch at Rentround, we’ve also included some data on average rental yields across various postcodes in the UK. 

The yield data will hopefully help you judge how much your own yield should be depending on your location. Your actual yield will depend on your purchase price etc. But the trend column we’ve included will help you understand if there’s scope for you to look into increasing your rent due to recent location fluctuations.